Strategies for Managing Tensions between Public Employment and Private Service Delivery

Jackson, Cynthia Y.

doi:10.2307/3380879

Cited by 10 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…Different measures have been proposed for assisting public employees who become displaced because of privatization (Eggers & O'Leary, 1994;Fernandez, Lowman, & Rainey, 2002;Jackson, 1997;NCEP, 1988). Employee assistance programs and services-including retraining, job placement, counseling, and reimbursement for lost pension and other benefits-can facilitate the transition to employment outside of government.…”

Section: Reducing Opposition To Privatizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Looking for Evidence of Public Employee Opposition to Privatization

Fernández

Smith²

2006

Review of Public Personnel Administration

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Contemporary public administration encompasses a wide variety of service delivery options. During the past two decades, privatization has become an increasingly utilized and legitimized approach. The perception that privatization poses a threat to public employment is seemingly widespread. Indeed, public sector unions often challenge the adoption of privatization programs. There is little evidence that individual rank-and-file public employees oppose privatization, however. In this study, the authors develop a multivariate model of support for privatization. Using a large-size public opinion data set from Georgia, the authors test the model and find that an individual's employment in the public sector is a predictor of opposition to privatization. The authors then discuss the practical implications of public employee opposition to privatization. The authors conclude with a discussion of ways for reducing such opposition.

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Section: Reducing Opposition To Privatizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Looking for Evidence of Public Employee Opposition to Privatization

Fernández

Smith²

2006

Review of Public Personnel Administration

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“…These impacts reflect the fact that minority workers and women frequently have less seniority than their nonminority counterparts, and they are often in lower level jobs that are most likely to be privatized, including those in areas such as grounds maintenance, building maintenance, solid waste collection, and semiskilled office/clerical work. This point is stressed by Cynthia Jackson (1997) in an article addressing the tension between public employment and the delivery of services by private contractors. Because of the significant adverse effects of contracting out on minority employment in U.S. municipalities, Jackson argued that cities that wish to engage in privatization efforts should develop programs that, among other things, allow their employees to have influence on decisions to contract out specified services, permit their employees to compete with private service providers for contracts, or that require private contractors make jobs available to public-sector workers laid off because of privatization (Jackson, 1997).…”

Section: A Look At Earlier Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contracting and the Bureaucratic Representation of Minorities and Women: Examining Evidence From Federal Agencies

Brown

Kellough

2019

Review of Public Personnel Administration

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This study examines the question of whether the extent of contracting out by U.S. federal agencies has an impact on the representation of minorities and women in those agencies. Contracting often results in reductions in force (RIF), which may occur at the lower and middle levels where there is significant representation of minorities and women. As a result, agencies that engage in higher levels of contracting may have lower levels of representation of minorities and women overall and in selected grade levels, controlling for other known determinants of minority and female representation. A panel design is employed with data on outside contracts as a proportion of each agency’s budget from 2009 to 2015. Those data are matched with a 1-year lag to data on the employment of African Americans, Hispanics, and women from 2010 to 2016. Findings indicate that contracting is associated with lower levels of African American, Hispanic, and female employment in selected grade levels.

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“…[16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23] Much of this work focuses on increased flexibility afforded to managers by employment-at-will laws. 20,23 Additional civil service reforms discussed in the literature include decentralization, [24][25][26][27][28] performance-based pay, [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41] broadbanding/declassification, 2,-42-44 deregulation, 6,16,[45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52] and privatization. [53][54][55][56][57] Only a few of these papers focused on how these reforms impact the ability to hire employees.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Much of this work focuses on increased flexibility afforded to managers by employment-at-will laws 20,2324–28 performance-based pay,29–41 broadbanding/declassification,2,42–44 deregulation,6,16,45–52 and privatization 53–57. Only a few of these papers focused on how these reforms impact the ability to hire employees.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

State Laws Governing the Hiring of Public Health Government Employees, 2023

Yeager,

Demosthenidy,

Burns

2024

Journal of Public Health Management &Amp; Practice

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Objective: Governmental public health agencies have experienced longstanding challenges in recruiting individuals at the state and local level. Understanding civil service laws as they relate to the hiring processes is an important component of recruitment and increasing public health workforce capacity. This study presents state hiring laws and regulations governing the public health government workforce. Methods: Legal mapping techniques were employed to collect and code data on current hiring laws governing governmental public health employees across all 50 states. The review of laws included constitutions, statutes and regulations, and searches of administrative code. Results: In 12 states, the laws do not specify civil service exam criteria or they have no mention of civil service exams in the law. Almost a third of states have laws that establish civil service exam requirements without specifying conditions for when exams must be required, or which positions allow which types of exam/criteria. Similarly, almost all of the states that have civil service exams denoted in their laws have unspecified language about whether there are exam fees. Requirements for the maintenance/use of state hiring lists are in place in 36 states and 26 states have a non-public health agency managing this process. Nearly all states (n = 48, 96%) require hiring preferences for certain types of individuals, most commonly veterans (n = 48, 96%) and family members of veterans (n = 30, 60%). No state laws provide hiring preferences for individuals from public health fellowships or special training programs. Conclusion: Key findings suggest that the laws governing the merit system and civil service vary and often lack clarity, which may be difficult for public health agencies and for potential employees to understand, navigate, and successfully recruit key employees. The recruitment and hiring of new governmental public health staff are complicated by the management of hiring by other state agencies and the vague civil service exam requirements and process. Developing preferences for hiring individuals who have additional practical training in public health (eg, public health fellowships and AmeriCorps) should be considered.

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Strategies for Managing Tensions between Public Employment and Private Service Delivery

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

Looking for Evidence of Public Employee Opposition to Privatization

Looking for Evidence of Public Employee Opposition to Privatization

Contracting and the Bureaucratic Representation of Minorities and Women: Examining Evidence From Federal Agencies

State Laws Governing the Hiring of Public Health Government Employees, 2023

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